Morning journal and courier., 1887-06-01
CORRESPONDENCE.


 CORRESPONDENCE
 In Normandy--Pretty women-.The
 Cathedral at Bayeux-Falaise.-A
 Good SehemeL1ving Cheap-The
 Cost of TraveI--Back to Paris.
 HOTEL MURIcE, PARIS, May 13. To the Editor of the JOURNAL AND COURIER:
 In the introduction to Murray's handbook to Normandy, Brittany, &tc., and in a para graph referring to hotels this sentence oc- CUTS: ''Some of the most important essen tials to sanitary comfort and personal decen- cy are utterly disregarded, and evince state of degradation not to be expected in civil ized country; a fact discreditable to French manners and habits" I don't copy this for the purpose of affording New Haven gram marians an opportunity of discussing what may be the subject of the verb "evince," but to state that for the last four days have been there, and that the verdict is awfully, awfully true. From two towns where I went purposing to stay day or two I was driven away because I could not re-evolute back to piggery. It is extraordinary, be- cause in every other thing the Normandy folks are very attractive. The men are great
 
 uble consideration; and the women are as pretty, as neat and as attractive as any wo- men in Europe. They have dark eyes and hair, straight features, small, pouting lips, ruddy, wholesome complexions; and they look at you with such an eXquisitely mild and roguish meekness that you are sure their hearts are as warm and as pleasant as the first cracking fire from logs in Novem- Der. It is too bad, for the country all the way from Nantes to Cherbourg is covered with most precious specimens of the archi- lecture of the early and later Normans. There is no more instructive cathedral in Europe than the cathedral of Bayeux; in struetive because it shows the whole history of Gothic architecture from the very begin hing. The English hate it. It makes them mad. Their writers belittle 1t and try to make out that it's different parts were built a century or two after they really were, for Englishmen would not be Englishmen if they did not continue to assert-in the face of the most absolute proof to the contrary-that
 Gothic architecture was the product of an
 English brain.
 To go to Bayeux with the proper materials, and to study the cathedral till you could tell
 the exact dete for the putting of each stone in place-what delightful work! But how
 is one to become inorganics The English
 have made thorough study of their cathe-
 drals They know when each part of each building was constructed. They claim prior ity of styles, and until the French study the archaeology of their churches the claims of
 the English will continue to affect weak and
 ignorant minds. One Frenchman, N. Ru-
 prich Robert, has quite walked up to the
 emergency. He is making havoc with Eng fish assertions. Like welI-sent ball amid upstart tenplns.
 And then what place can be more interest ing than Falaisea Here are the ruins of the castle which the dukes of Normandy regard i. iy,t of which their far-reaching power Iadiated. Here Robert-the-D Devil undoubtedly acquired the end of his name by 'raising" it. You are shown the spot on the ramparts where, one day after an abundant dinner, he lazlly surveyed his domains through one of thu large opera-glasses of the period. Suddenly thrill went through and through him, for an accidental depression of the lorgnettes had revealed little maid washing her toes in a fountain at the base of the castle walls. Dear little Alletts, the tanners daughter, knew nothing of the hubbub above-at least we must suppose she didn't-but went on washing each sweet little toe. The e1clama- tion Robert used is not known. It was not s'Great Scott;" it was more likely "Great David" And William the Conqueror was born, whose kingdom is to-day the strongest kingdom on the face of the earth, while Sol omons are selling old clothes in Chatham street. And if you don't believe it there is
 
 sat, and there is the tannery still run by her descendants on the male side, just now decked about with all the smiling birds and blossoms of spring-time. The chap would be hard hearted indeed who would net make chivalric obeisance to so dainty bit of his tory.
 By the by, does New Haven know that it l has in it's midst family that can trace it's descent from William as straight as string? F. s. s.
 It has occurred to my fertile brain that the formation of an Anglo-American Hotel Con- ! struction company would be capital scheme A frst-rate hotel at Falaise would ! make the town the English Mecca. With 1 good hotels at Caen, Lisieux, Bayeux and Constance all Normandy south of the Seine | would be packed with tourists. The country | is charming and everything to eat and drink | is most abundant, most excellent and costs about one quarter of home prices. l met an Englishman who told me that he, his wife ! and two children had been boarding with a very respectable French family at Falaise for thirty francs (six dollars) week. of course l thought he meant apiece. But he didn't; he 1 meant for the whole of them. And he l looked very well fed too. The only thing l had occasion to buy was sponge. For six ! ty-five cents ($0.13) I bought sponge for which am sure Klock would have asked me at least dollar and half. I shall be hap py to communicate with New Haven and ad- iacent capitalists in reference to my Anglo American Hotel Construction company Qimi- ted) Government concessions easily ob- tained through competent parties by we'll es- tablished French processes.
 Coming up from Le Havre yesterday had the curiosity to compare the rates of French and United States travelling. hrst-class ticket from Le Hayre to Paris costs twenty eight francs ten cents. A seat in the coupe cost two francs ninety cents, and you Will pay anywhere from two to ten francs for transportation of baggage. Taking an aver age of five francs for baggage, the trip would cost thirty-fve francs eighty cents; or at the rate of five francs to the dollar, seven dollars and sixteen cents. The distance is two hun dred and twenty-eight kilometres, equal to one hundred and forty-two and one-half miles, That makes it at about five cents g mile, or two and half times as much as It costs to travel on the much abused "Consoli- dated" You can travel second-class for about one-quarter less; and third-class for about half, but, as in France, there are no second or third-class carriages on express trains. The arrangement is only for those who are akin to snails. The ordinary trains
 make but little over twenty miles an hour.
 And now for Paris with all it has with
 which to restore and reinvigorate. First the Salon with it's new crop of artists. Will their works give promise or make sada Then one's old friends in the Louvre. How sad it will be to find oneself too old or too
 unhappy to be charmed by them any lon ger. Then the theaters; above all the Fran cais, where am going-but going alone tonight to sec Dumas new play "Francil- lon." The cafes, the "Bois,' the Boule- yards, where life never ceases for an in stant. And it seems but yesterday that l
 was driving a 2:40 gait with "Hop" on his
 pet Boulevard. PERIANDER.